Online sales show strong annual growth

Tuesday, July 24, 2018 - 10:00 by Simon Crisp

Statistics published last week by Adobe have shown that there was a 10 per cent increase in purchases made via safe shopping online during the first six months of 2018 compared with the same period in 2017.

This means that British consumers have spent more than £28 billion on the web so far this year, with the second quarter seeing stronger sales than the first.

As expected the World Cup is being singled out as having a catalysing impact on the e-commerce sector in particular and the retail market as a whole, with shoppers splashing out £218.7 million within the first 24 hours of the tournament commencing in June.

The report also looked into the different types of products that people are picking up via safe shopping online, with 52 per cent of Brits stating that they had made web-based grocery orders at least once in the last 12 months.

By comparison online grocery shopping is far less popular in the US, with only a third of Americans adopting this practice.

In terms of how regularly consumers buy groceries online, 40 per cent of UK respondents said that this was their main way of shopping for food. Meanwhile this applied to just 23 per cent of those in the US.

There are many different studies into the state of e-commerce, both domestically and on a global scale. Britain is certainly a leader in this field, although in spite of its mature online shopping market, there is still apparently room for double digit growth to be enjoyed, at least for the time being.

How well the high street will cope in the face of this problematic news is another question, and with store closures picking up pace internationally, it is harder than ever for bricks and mortar outlets to connect with tech-savvy shoppers.